Hello everyone! Today we would like to tell you a little bit more about the people behind the INSOMNIA: the Ark. Have you ever wondered who was responsible for that specific piece of furniture or dialogue line (please, hide your tomatoes)? It’s time to find out!

Since there are quite a few insomniacs who made this game possible (other than our respective Kickstarter backers, of course), we will split this material into a few parts. Without further adieu, please welcome our first participants...

INSOMNIA is my first project and before that, I had only occasional experience in the video game industry as an artist and animator. My initial goal was just to create beautiful 3D scenes but I ended up being the CEO of the company.

However, when it comes to indie teams, combining several roles is quite common. I was no exception and served as an artist, art director, and level designer at different stages of development. I did the initial concept art for INSOMNIA but at some point, I realized that in order to meet my own levels of standard and expectations, I needed to recruit more experienced professionals. In addition to that, I’m responsible for the way the characters look and how they are built, certain UI aspects, AI tuning and loot distribution in the game.

Obviously, old-school RPGs like Fallout 1 and 2 were my initial source of inspiration. However, later we felt like we don’t want to make just a clone of these games. Instead, we should try to take a step forward within the genre. This made the overall development process somewhat harder but it gave us valuable experience in return.

When it comes to other games, I really enjoyed Total War, Mount and Blade and the RPG genre in general. Lately though, there isn’t much to it other than the second installment of Pillars of Eternity. I also dig games like This War of Mine, Limbo and Inside — they doesn’t require too much time and feel satisfying after just 3-4 hours of gameplay. I feel like this is a very effective way to design games and would like to move in this direction with my future projects.

My story started in 2010 when I first met Anatoliy Guyduk. That summer he introduced me to the “Icar Project” which later became what we know as INSOMNIA: The Ark. I’ve joined the team and started covering the technical side of things.

I was responsible for implementing all of the main quests and some of the sidequests as well. Which means I must be the most knowledgeable person when it comes to the story of the game. I really enjoy working on this title as the member of the team and I feel that this is the best source of inspiration for me.

I play INSOMNIA very often since we still need to improve quite a few things. Other than that I’m fond of 7,62 and games from Rockstar.

I clearly remember how I was invited to Mono Studio by one of my friends — she told me that they have recently started developing “a big game”. When I first visited them back in 2012 it didn’t take a long time to realize we are cut out to work together: I loved the atmosphere and aesthetics of the game and the studio itself. So many ambitious ideas were born there, and so many have never meant to see the light of the day (as we figured out later).

I’ve joined the team when INSOMNIA was still in the pre-production phase. It looked different and generally felt like a collection of emotional and chaotic concepts. It took a few years of episodic work (we took our time, so to speak) to create a core for the future game, and we were able to continue with a more active development ever since we were successfully funded on Kickstarter in 2014.

My responsibility was to help develop the setting and the story. After we were satisfied with the outlines of the INSOMNIA’s world I became more active with adding details to the lore, characters, dialogues, and narrative design. Generally, I ended up being involved in everything text related (localisations, etc.)

During my work on INSOMNIA, I was inspired by all kinds of things. You’ll never know which cultural element will give you some fresh ideas — it can be a 14th-century musician’s bio, a Korean art-house, Russian B-movies from the 90s or some random Facebook story.

Usually, though, this role is reserved to the sci-fi literature of 40s-80s, historical events, movies/TV-shows/animation with no specific genre or time period (sci-fi and good old classics are always a priority though), old-school comic books, as well as art of all shapes and forms. Also, I really admire the Japanese creative mindset — there’s always a big chance to find all kinds of madness being produced there (especially in the 70s).

These days I rarely invest my time in hardcore games, however, I really love Space Rangers, Paradox games, Cuphead, Ori and Blind Forest. Playing Kingdom Come sounds like a good idea but I can’t let myself to spend 100+ hours on a game these days.

Mostly, I play games with outstanding stories and atmosphere like Darkwood, Soma, Return of Obra Dinn, Cat Lady. I also dig story-driven FPS games like Bioshock or F.E.A.R (oh, I just realized I’ve spent at least 50 hours playing Into The Breach). Some time ago I had a crush on “weird” titles like Stanley Parable and Magic Circle. And there is certainly a list of games I can’t avoid playing no matter how much time it will take to complete them (Talos Principle, Portal and The Witness).

That’s all for now folks! We will get back to you next week hopefully with some additional info regarding v1.5 and the second installment of “Meet the team” focused on other team members who had a huge impact on INSOMNIA.

Stay tuned!

Hello everyone! Today, we will cover quite a few topics regarding the latest game-related activities including the current progress with patch v1.5 and a few other improvements coming with it.


As you may know, INSOMNIA is undergoing transition to the latest version of Unreal Engine 4 in order to improve overall performance and fix an array of issues that couldn't be addressed otherwise.

Thanks to your continuous support of INSOMNIA on Steam we were able to expand our QA staff and plan to hire additional devs to our studio so that we can speed up our progress.

Last Friday, March 15th, we have rolled out the latest iteration of the game and internal tests showed that there’s more fixing to be done and testing to carry out. As painful as a delay may be, we want to keep working further on the patch instead of simply releasing with several bugs that may cause issues for any fixes or content updates that we plan to add later down the line.



We are expecting to have our next QA session next Friday, March 29th, which should give us a better idea of when v1.5 is going to be released.


In addition to the list of bugs mentioned before, we’ve managed to address a few more issues reported by the community including:

• The lack of player indicator on the level map;
  
• Map icons from the previously visited level overlaying the map of the current level;
  
• The lack of durability parameter in gun descriptions.

We are also working on fixing Steam VR initialization upon game launch. Please keep in mind that this list is not final and is subject to change and expand. As always, we will keep you posted on our progress.

Until next time!

Hello everyone! Today we are giving you our 50th Steam update and we’d like to dedicate it to the press coverage INSOMNIA received since its release. Other than the usual media attention our game managed to participate in the self-cooling headset tests held by CNET. And of course it’s time to share a few more selected quotes:

“Insomnia: The Ark has been a long time coming. Developed by Russian developer Mono Studio over the course of nine years, it gained a significant following after a successful 2014 Kickstarter campaign. Now this retro sci-fi RPG is finally ready to play, and looks like an impressive combination of Fallout, Mass Effect, and Bioshock.” - Marshall Lemon @ VG24/7

“The art direction is mesmerizing. The dieselpunk Nomah civilization has a fascinating and beautiful aesthetic. It looks like a combination of Soviet propaganda and architecture with retro-futuristic elements. As said in the preview, the influence from the art direction of Fallout and BioShock is very clear, though it’s not just a barefaced imitation. It’s an original combination of elements and details, with a sleek space station visual design.” - Richard Costa @ Techraptor

We are also expecting an in-depth interview with 80 Level to be published for everyone to read in the nearest future. It covers quite a few peculiar technical details regarding the game.


Even though it’s been around 5 months since the game has been released, we are still seeing let’s plays and streams pop-up from all around the world. So if you haven’t tried INSOMNIA yourself yet, we recommend checking out one of the following videos in your native language:

English
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qj14jhGRNnI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7gfA_iQROz0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xgmTZq2t4XE
Polski
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PtdrsIEHq8w https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v-1TI2RO-cA
Deutsch
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c4JqC7Rw-Dg
Português
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aUk7cNIzBfg
Español
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qo_jKN8tEAk
Thanks to everyone for spreading the news! Until next time :)

P.S. we will have more news regarding v1.5 in our next update.

Hello everyone! Today, we will shed some light on the backstory of the main character who is generally known as citizen KZ0012 (but you can call him Elliot, if you so desire). One can make an assumption that these letters and numbers are random and meaningless. However, this is not the case when it comes to INSOMNIA’s world, which we have been developing for so many years. So what does KZ0012 mean?

Over four centuries had elapsed since Object 6 started on its journey. Its destination - the Evacuation Point - remaining a symbol of hopes and dreams. Thousands of people are lying in synthetic slumber in order to one day occupy their place in a well-oiled government machine.



Traditional reproduction and the institutions of family have long been abolished. The population numbers are kept in check by embryonic incubation and genetic engineering.

Citizen ID is a personal number which is given to each citizen of Urb on the day they are born. Each ID consists of letters and digits which stand for the generation indicator and index number respectively. The first artificial generation was born 97 years after Exodus and got an AA indicator:



You start your journey as citizen KZ0012 after an automatic awakening procedure is executed and your multi-year sleep session is brought to an end. KZ0012 was born in 382 (each second letter in a Citizen ID stands for one of the 26 years which are part of a certain generation) and was the 12th baby born in this particular year.



He experienced his first Big Sleep procedure in 399 when he was 17, spending 5 years in stasis. KZ0012 was 23 the second time he was hibernated, spending 2 more years in Limb before the terrorist attack shook the facility and many citizens were brought back to reality in the most shocking manner. Upon awakening, KZ0012 starts experiencing the symptoms of somnia in form of hallucinations and visions — his first taste of somnic space.

But that is a whole different story...

Hello everyone! Today, we’d like to share details about a few other improvements coming with the next patch. In addition to the list of bugs mentioned in our previous posts, we’ve managed to narrow down and address a few more issues reported by the community including:

• Localization settings no longer reset each time the game is launched. Basically one of the major goals we have is to refactor the way localization works behind the scenes, so that we can add more languages with ease in the future;
  
  
• The number of items with no icons and descriptions has been reduced. We did our best to eliminate all of the reported cases. However, there still might be some left (would really appreciate your feedback on this when the update is out):
  
  
  
  
• Fixed sound effects resembling running that can be heard while characters are walking;
  
• The door in Wild Grove is now operational after the fuse box is repaired by the player (this fix won’t take effect retroactively, however).

We are also looking forward to adding Steam Cloud support to INSOMNIA along with other highly requested features and fixes. We will keep you posted on our progress.

Until next time!

Hello everyone! As we’ve previously mentioned, this week we are bringing you additional info regarding the upcoming update to version 1.5. Since it’s not always possible to get the whole picture by simply looking at screenshots, we have prepared a short video demonstration:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FiuFGyhsLOg
Please keep in mind that fixing the various texture-related issues, removing localization-related bugs and optimization were our main priority. However, the visual upgrade came as an additional bonus due to the engine’s improved tool set and capabilities.

We are looking forward to fixing more bugs reported by our community in the v1.5 of INSOMNIA. As always, we will keep you posted regarding our progress.

Until next time!

Hello everyone! Today, we would like to give you a first look at the changes that v1.5 will introduce to INSOMNIA. One of the greatest things about the 4.21.2 version of the Unreal Engine 4 is DirectX 12 support which brings dramatic changes to the appearance of in-game locations (click on the thumbnails below for full resolution):



As you can see, the lighting effects have been improved drastically, making Object 6 look and feel more realistic and sinister than ever before. You can also expect DirectX 11 support, even though INSOMNIA worked only with DirectX 10 initially:



One other thing we are really happy with is the texture streaming feature that fixes the missing textures issue that some of you have experienced before:



As more tests of v1.5 are carried out, we will be able to give you additional details regarding performance optimization.

Stay tuned for next week’s update!

Hello everyone! We know you are waiting for the next patch/update for INSOMNIA and news will be coming soon. As a reminder, this patch is expected to improve the performance in some of the larger locations, introduce DirectX 12 support and texture streaming which should fix the missing textures bug. We will have an updated list of improvements and patch notes when the process gets to its final stages.

Interestingly enough, this is not the first time we’ve been updating/switching technology that INSOMNIA utilizes in order to bring Object 6 to life. And since we still get questions along the lines of “what took you so long to deliver the game in the first place (around 8 years)?”, we’d like to cover this question today. Sit down for some story time :)


It started with the simple idea of making a game that would continue the legacy of the classic “Golden Era of RPG” titles. Most ideas never find their physical form and keep haunting their authors forever after. Not in our case. INSOMNIA started to materialize on paper in the form of words and sketches almost immediately. This process continued for quite some time since no one on the team had any previous experience in coding games.



And while the team and the design document was growing, it was actually time to pick the engine and the technology so that we could finally start bringing INSOMNIA to life.


So the decision was made and Ogre3D, the open-source graphics rendering engine, was picked for the first version of the game that was proudly presented to the public back in 2013. At this point in time, INSOMNIA was presented as an isometric co-operative online role-playing game with tactical elements.



However, potential fans were clearly not interested in yet another online RPG. After some deliberation, we’ve made the decision to focus on single player elements instead. Developing the game in this direction took another year, and we came back with our first publicly available tech-demo in 2014.



This change made quite a few people happy and we were able to successfully kickstart INSOMNIA! The secured funds allowed us to expand the team, improve working conditions and continue the development more effectively. However, all the previous months spent working on the projects have shown us that the Ogre3D engine was severely limiting our capabilities. We had to spend more time on developing our own tools and improving the engine instead of working on the game itself. This is when the idea to move INSOMNIA to the Unreal Engine 4 had first popped up in our team meetings.




The UE4 engine seemed to include all of the tools our team wanted: incredible visuals, powerful development environment and detailed documentation. The downside was — we had to transfer everything that had been done so far using Ogre3D to the new engine. This took quite a lot of time and resources, which pushed us to reach out to our Kickstarter community for their support once again. Thanks to their help, we were able to get additional funds and continued to breath life into INSOMNIA’s world.

It’s always hard to tell if the decisions that are being made at certain moments are right or wrong. Looking back, we still feel that switching to Unreal Engine 4 from Ogre3D was worth it in the end:



It took around 3 years for us to move from one engine to another and actually add all of the remaining content to the game. We also had to update the UE4 itself once in a while to stay up to date with the latest improvements to the engine, which also took time. At some point we had to stop this process, so that we could start locking down changes and wrapping up development.


When INSOMNIA was released, our team was using the the 4.16.3 version of UE4 (with the current version being 4.21.2) which performed well on our in-house machines. However, the launch brought in thousands of people with all kinds of graphics cards, monitors and other computer hardware on which the game running on an outdated version of the engine did not always work as expected. The feedback you’ve been providing us for the past 3+ months resulted in 4 patches and our team realizing that we need to update our technology once again to fix the issues that can’t be addressed otherwise (localizations being mixed up, optimization problems, missing textures etc.).



Since the difference between 4.16.3 and 4.21.2 is huge, we couldn’t jump from the older version to the newest one in one go. We had to update the game step by step and this is why this has taken a few weeks of our time. Luckily, the hardest part of this transition is already behind us and we are in the middle of finalizing the build as we speak. There’s still more testing to be done though.

Until next time :)

P.S. here’s a little bonus for you: an old “The Making Of” video that we’ve never shown to our Steam crowd before: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o3lIJU2bia8

Hello everyone! Today we’d like to continue unveiling some of the little details about Object 6 that could be easily missed unless you knew where to look.


If you’ve been paying attention to the main story in INSOMNIA, you should’ve heard about Limb — a colossal delta-module storage facility that hosts three quarters of Urb's population undergoing the Big Sleep procedure. So you’ve heard about it, you’ve seen it in the videos, gifs and screenshots, but does is it actually exist as a location inside the game? Yes, it does! You can’t go there (yet) but it’s certainly a part of the station:




We are quite sure you’ve got the Blade Runner and Planescape: Torment references while playing INSOMNIA, but has anyone paid attention to the “random” books that have been thoroughly collected and stored in the small but proud library inside Object 6’s one and only brothel?




As a legitimate citizen of Object 6 you don’t always pay attention to the people that actually make your life more comfortable (as far as this can be possible on a giant spaceship that has been traveling for more than 400 years). The thing is those people who are often dismissively referred to as “ghetters” work hard to make sure the station can stay operational day after day. And yet, no one notices that. Rusty engines and dirty dishes won’t clean themselves, you know, so show some appreciation for the work of others:



This is just the tip of the iceberg and we’d really love to hear your own stories about all of the little nuances of INSOMNIA’s world you’ve discovered during your playthrough. Share them in the comments below!

Hello everyone! While our team is working on a more detailed report regarding INSOMNIA’s transition to the latest version of Unreal Engine 4, we’d like to introduce a useful tool that might be handy for at least some of you guys. We are talking about the official FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) thread that is now live in the Community Hub.

We did our best to cover the most frequently asked questions in this document, however we are quite sure this FAQ can be improved greatly with your help. So basically if you have been asking a specific question(s) in our Community Hub, got your problem solved via either the involvement of fellow players or the dev team AND believe that this information will be helpful to other insomniacs — let us know and we will expand the current version of the FAQ!


As some of you might remember, we held a live stream last month. We were giving away quite a few copies of the game itself, Deluxe Set DLC and OST to those lucky ones who were fast enough to grab those Steam keys (we had more than 600 simultaneous viewers that day, yay!).

If you didn’t get a chance to view the stream, we have some great news for you — our team of scavengers was able to recover the original source of the stream that has been broadcasted from one of the most distant and abandoned sectors of Object 6. It is believed that the person who is responsible for this act of low tech video vandalism (illegal broadcasts are generally not allowed) was able to recover an ancient piece of simulation technology to virtually roam the rusty corridors of the station and interact with it.

We did our best to recover and remaster this broadcast for your viewing pleasure but please be aware of possible static disturbances that might occur in the process. We warned you :D
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zK1nYLDPDvI Until next time!